1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to the field of footwear. More particularly, this invention relates to infant footwear that attaches to clothing, thus preventing it from falling off a baby's foot and becoming lost.
2. The Background
It is important for infants to wear socks or booties in order to maintain body temperature, as feet are one of the primary ports through which heat escapes. Additionally, from an economic standpoint, it is expensive to lose an infant's socks.
FIG. 1 is a diagram depicting a typical infant sock. It is similar to most adult socks, sized proportionately. However, infant socks are lost easily in a number of ways. One common way to lose the socks is by taking babies in and out of car seats, strollers, swings, carriers and the like. These all have some type of harness to protect the baby, which generally consists of at least one part that fits between a baby's legs. As the baby's legs are taken in and out, it is easy for a sock to fall off of the baby's foot either from catching on the harness or from being pushed into a place that is not a well fitting part of the foot. Babies also squirm, kick, roll, and crawl during various development stages, and all of this motion tends to push the socks off feet. An additional way in which socks are lost is around four to eight months, babies "discover" their feet. Babies become fascinated by their own feet and do such things as pull off their own socks, put their toes in their mouths, and generally pull on their feet and toes. One can imagine how once these socks are pulled off, they are discarded wherever the baby may be, including the mall, the playground, the street, etc. Unless a parent or caregiver happens to notice, the sock is then lost.
Houghteling in U.S. Pat. No. 4,976,050 attempted to deal with this by inventing an elastic strap with a snap on either side that fits around the baby's ankle. While this is one way to approach the problem, it has several drawbacks. One is that if the elastic does not fit tightly enough around the ankle, it is still easy to loose getting in and out of various baby apparatus and in the other ways discussed above. However, if the elastic is too tight, then the infant's circulation could be compromised. Finding this delicate balance is a challenge and what may work for the baby at three months may be too tight at five months or too loose at one month. Thus, the sock may only work in peak performance for a limited window of time.
What is needed is a sock that is able to grow with the baby for a number of months and has the capability of not being lost from the child's person.